> > O.k. I have been thinking about this some more, and I have come up with a couple> alternate of solutions.> > The simplest is the observation that right now 10MB is about what it> takes to hold every Linux driver out there. So all you really need is> a 16MB system, to avoid a device probing loader. And probably> noticeably less than that. The only systems I see having real> problems are old systems where device enumeration is not reliable, and> require human intervention anyway.> > A second is to just make certain there is some kind of fallback path> so if the image is too large have a way to load a smaller one. When> you consider that older systems had less memory it has a reasonable> chance of working properly.> > My final and favorite is to take an ELF image, define a couple of ELF> note types, and add a bunch those notes saying which pieces are> hardware dependent. So a smart ELF loader can prune the image as it> is loaded, and a stupid one will just attempt to load everything. And> with the setup for this not being bootloader specific it will probably> encourage device pruning loaders.> > Am I being optimistic or are there any pressing cases for callbacks to> the firmware?>

Ok, now let me ask the question that hopefully should be obvious to everyone now...

WHAT'S THE POINT?

All you're doing is an awfully complex song and dance to *avoid* implementing a solution that, while imperfect, is thoroughly established and has worked for 20 years.